


For there are ghosts in the air

by LiveOakWithMoss



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: (It's Maglor's fault), Accidental heart-breaker Maglor, Angst, Bitchiness, Broken Hearts, Cameos by Celegorm and Maedhros, Celegorm knows what's up, Cousin Incest, Curufin is the prickliest boyfriend, Don't imply shit about Finrod and the Edain, Finwions lose their tempers, Finwions need to date non-Finwions, Flashbacks, Ghosts of relationships past, Jealousy, M/M, Obsession, Pining while having sex, Snark, Spite orgasms, Teen tantrums, The usual Nargothrond drama, Threats of fratricidal stabbing, Valinor Teens (tm), Yes someone gets pushed against a wall, nothing says 'I love you' like complete avoidance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-03
Updated: 2015-08-06
Packaged: 2018-04-12 16:15:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,955
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4486278
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LiveOakWithMoss/pseuds/LiveOakWithMoss
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Friend, my enemy, I call you out.</i>
</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>In Nargothrond, Curufin does not sleep easy, despite – or because of – who sleeps beside him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. You there with a bad thorn in your side

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sassynails](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sassynails/gifts).



> 0\. [ten-thousand-leaves](ten-thousand-leaves.tumblr.com) won first place in my anniversary giveaway, and this is their custom fic! The request was for Finrod/Curufin with past Finrod/Maglor, and Curufin not dealing well with the whole ‘your ex is my brother’ thing, and I…ran with it.  
> 1\. I ran so far with it, in fact, that this turned into a multichapter fic that will update over the course of the next week, on both Tumblr and AO3.  
> 2\. With all my apologies to Dylan Thomas for appropriating his poetry.

It was late and the wind was up, howling bleakly in the forest around Nargothrond, though its doleful roar was muted by the thick walls and heavy stone and barely filtered through to the inhabitants within. Curufin, unmoved by and unaware of the wind’s cries, was dressed down for the evening and paying attention to nothing much but the metal in his hands and the background crackle of the fire.

As such, when his brother’s voice broke the silence he started, having half forgotten he was not alone.

“I sometimes find myself haunted.” Celegorm spoke as if continuing a conversation they had left off only recently.

Curufin looked up at him, eyebrows raised.

“It is most evident in my dreams,” Celegorm mused. He was leaning back against Huan’s broad side, his large feet bare and warming by the fire. He folded his arms behind his head and stared meditatively into the flames. “In my dreams, Umbarto comes to me, and demands answers.” The leaping flames cast his eyes into shadow, and he looked for a moment, unusually inscrutable. “Our lost little one,” he murmured, softly, “preys on me.”

Curufin ran his tongue over his teeth and his hands over the twisted piece of metal he’d been studying. “I have more reason than you to feel guilty over Ambarussa,” he said, shortly.

“And yet you are not.”

“Guilt is a wasted emotion.”

“So you’ve said.” Celegorm stretched out his legs and blinked, and suddenly looked more like himself. “As father did, too. But waste or not, still, he haunts me.”

“Not me.” Their father, of course, was another matter.

“I know.” Celegorm smiled, and Curufin immediately became uneasy. “ _You_ are haunted by one of our brothers who is still alive.”

“What?” Curufin’s hands slipped on the metal and he almost dropped it. He muttered a curse.

“Haunted by our sweet voiced bard,” said Celegorm carelessly. “He trails you like a ghost, and follows you to bed.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Makalaurë,” said Celegorm, though Curufin already knew, and hated, the answer. “You are obsessing over him, sweetheart, and it saddens me greatly. You know if there were any of your brothers you should be obsessing over, it should be me.” He tossed his great head, and bared his white teeth. “But _no_ , gentle Káno is the one whom you whisper about in your sleep.”

“I do no such thing!”

“You do.”

“I do n – Oh, this is ridiculous.” Curufin slammed down the instrument in his hands and got to his feet. “I’m leaving.”

“Say hello to Findaráto for me,” said Celegorm, a wicked smile twisting his lips. “And try not to think about how our brother had him first.”

Curufin slammed from the room in a fury, leaving Celegorm to his fire and his dog and his rolling laugh.

_I would if I could._

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

It had been a frustrating day. The council meeting had been interminable, and insufferable, and Celegorm had fidgeted endlessly next to him until Curufin was ready to drive a letter-opener into his thigh to still him, or at least break the monotony.

“You wouldn’t dare,” Celegorm had muttered out of the corner of his mouth, picking up this stray thought.

“Test me,” Curufin muttered back. “The only thing stopping me from pinning you to your damn seat like a bug on a pin is that this letter-opener isn’t long enough to go all the way through your fat leg.”

As Celegorm sputtered indignantly, Finrod had coughed from across the table, a cough that was almost certainly both a laugh and a warning. Both of them stilled, Celegorm planting both feet on the ground and leaning back in his seat, while Curufin carefully straightened his quill so that it aligned perfectly with the edge of his parchment.

The rest of the meeting had been even less interesting, and had been followed by a terse argument with Celebrimbor over something so mundane that Curufin couldn’t remember what it was an hour later. But his son was once more tense and tight-shouldered, and Curufin was weary of being the reason why. Boredom and annoyance and frustration warred within him, compounded by the claustrophobic feel of stillness and hushed voices that permeated Nargothrond. Usually he didn’t mind the quiet, or the enclosed space, but sometimes a fey mood took him, perhaps caught from Celegorm, and he felt the need to wrench free the ceiling and see the sky. He was tired of careful, guarded words, and idiotic arguments over nothing. He wanted true passion, he wanted blood and spirits running high, and his usual outlet for things like passion and hot-bloodedness was also the source of another source of frustration, and…was currently being damnably unbothered by any of this.

He turned restlessly against the silk sheets – he’d never liked silk as a material for bedding, it caught against the rough callouses of his hands – and fought his body’s instincts to fall into sated slumber. Was this what had become of him, a life bereft of passion or intrigue, nights of torpid lovemaking and days of interminable boredom? He turned over once more to stare at his companion. A familiar emotion, brother to resentment and all too familiar these days, rose up and caught in the back of his throat.  

Finrod seemed aware of none of this.

He was stretched out in bed beside Curufin, soft and sleepy and content, running vague fingers through his unbound golden hair as if he were contemplating braiding it but couldn’t quite muster the energy.

Curufin pulled Finrod’s hand away from his hair. “Leave it be.”

“Hm?”

“Leave it unbound.” Curufin might hate rolling over in the night to encounter a mouthful of Finrod’s hair, but it was worth it, in the dying light of the candle, to see Finrod naked and framed by the waves of gold. It made Curufin want to break him for his beauty, or to frame him, or mold him, somehow preserve him forever like this. For the first time he wished he had his mother’s skill and could make a Findaráto from stone, always this pliant and beautiful – and unchanging.

“Have you ever broken anything, because of me?” The question came from nowhere, and before he could stop it.

Finrod looked up curiously and laughed. “What a question. Do you mean along the line of oaths, or hearts?” His voice was teasing, and Curufin shook his head, annoyed.

“That is not what I – ”

“I believe,” mused Finrod, “that I have quite broken Edrahil’s faith in my sanity for taking you to my bed, but alas, there was only so long he could labor under the illusion I was not quite mad. His innocence had to be shattered eventually.”

“That is not what I meant,” snapped Curufin.

“What did you mean, then?”

“Have you ever broken – ” Curufin twisted his fingers irritably. “Any _thing_ , because of me.”

Finrod blinked. “I do not believe so. Curvo, why – ”

“You shattered your harp on account of my brother.”

“I never.” Finrod looked quite astonished. “While I will admit that Tyelkormo provokes me mercilessly at times, and I have found him terribly offensive in the past, I’m sure I would remember doing something as violent as breaking my harp over his thick skull – though I confess the idea is rather appealing.”

“Not _that_ brother. My other brother.” Curufin said the name, though it felt like speaking with a painful toothache. “Makalaurë.”

There was a long pause, and then recognition dawned in Finrod’s face. He looked surprised, and then slightly embarrassed. “Oh. That.” He brushed a loop of hair behind his ear, which had turned a light pink. “How embarrassing. I cannot believe you remember that.”

“It was all Tirion spoke of for several weeks.” This was a slight exaggeration, but Curufin could remember the gossip all too clearly. “It was quite the public _gesture_.” The word came out tinged with spite, and – he couldn’t deny it – envy.

“Ai, Elbereth.” Finrod passed a hand over his eyes. “I was so young, Curvo, I was such a melodramatic ass. I was wounded and emotional, and you know how it is, when you’re young and your heart is broken for the first time – you feel you will never get over it.”

“No, I am not familiar,” lied Curufin, coldly.

“Well, at any rate, in my silly young mind that brief love affair was writ large as the romance of the age, and having never experienced rejection nor pain before, I had no idea what to do with it.” Finrod shrugged, and shook his head, as if chiding a vision of his younger self standing before him. “Of course I now know that there are hurts that go far deeper and loves that run far truer, but in that moment, I was devastated as only the young and lovelorn can be, and I also had a theatrical sense of expression.” He smiled reminiscently. “A tendency that Makalaurë had a fair amount of influence on, in fact – I do believe he cultivated a sense of drama in me, and encouraged what he saw as artistic temperament.”

Curufin wanted to throw something.

“Artistic temperament or no, the public destruction of my harp was nothing more than the tantrum of a silly young boy with no true perspective and a petty desire to share his hurt with the world.” Finrod sighed, and sat up against the headboard. “I am embarrassed that you remember it, you must have been quite young yourself.”

He had been. But still, he remembered.

 

* * *

 

 

_“What happened?” asked Maitimo, quietly, as Makalaurë came into the kitchen and slumped against the wall._

_“He came back, again. He had written me something. Another thing. Ai, and he looked at me with those desperate blue eyes of his…” Makalaurë groaned and thumped his head back against the wall. “This was such a mistake.”_

_“I did tell you so.”_

_“Yes, thank you, Maitimo the Wise and Foreseeing who_ never _debauches our younger cousins. How’s Findekáno doing?”_

_“Hush, at least he’s older than Findaráto is. And he will probably give me an earful about my cruel brother breaking his friend’s heart…”_

_“Oh, Maitimo, stop! Do you think I was cruel, truly?”_

_“I was teasing you. Mostly.”_

_“Manwë, what a mess.” Makalaurë slid down the wall and buried his head in his knees. “The worst of it is that…no, I can’t say that, it would be too heartless.”_

_“The worst of it is that you find him so beautiful and sad that even though you’re the one making him sad you’re dying to use him as inspiration for a song,” said Maitimo, clattering around the kitchen. “Don’t you dare, Káno.”_

_“I won’t,” said Makalaurë, but Curufinwë could hear in his voice that his mind was already elsewhere._

_He slipped from the doorway where he’d been standing concealed listening to his brothers, and padded noiselessly down the hall to the front entrance. Peering out the window, concealed behind the long drapes, he could see the slight blond figure still sitting on their step, head buried in his arms much in the same way Makalaurë’s had been._

_As Curufinwë waited, Findaráto raised his head and got slowly to his feet. To Curufinwë’s surprise, Findaráto’s face was dry, though very pale. He brushed his long braid over his shoulder, and walked heavily down the front walk, his eyes dull and his lips tight._

_Makalaurë, still in the kitchen and now laughing at something Maitimo had said, did not watch him go._

_But Curufinwë did._


	2. With my whole heart under your hammer

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In Nargothrond, Curufin broods when Finrod would rather he be focusing on other things. In Valinor, Findaráto and Makalaurë make a scene.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 0\. The best arguments take place while making love.  
> 1\. (Not really. Don't use Finwions as role models for these things.)  
> 2\. Warnings: Finrod and Curufin in bed together, Curufin being jealous (and then quite rude). Valinor flashbacks to another installment of _How I met your brother_. Sneaky young Curvo, heartsick young Ingo, oblivious and excruciatingly artistic young Maglor.

Curufin wished, as he had many times, that he could better control the direction of his thoughts. So many things came easily to him and control was certainly not traditionally one of his weak points, and yet – over this he seemed helpless.  Certain avenues were so well-trod as to be inevitable, and he walked them, time and again.

When he had been young and prone to panic, his father used to kneel before him and put warm hands on his shoulders, looking him in the eye. He would speak kindly and tell Curufin his mind was like a wagon, running along a well-worn trail.

_“Have you not worried about this before?”_

_“Yes, but – ”_

_“And did it go awry, before?”_

_“No, but – ”_

_“Is there reason it should now?”_

_“No, but – ”_

_“Your mind knows its familiar paths too well. It is too easy to fall into the ruts of previously cut routes, even if they lead you nowhere of interest or importance. We must remember to pull ourselves from those ruts and cut new paths, not allow our energy and time to be spent on the same route to no avail. It is hard, one must work at it, but it is worth it. Do not let your mind turn its wheels uselessly on the paths of obsession and fear.”_

The problem with his father’s wise advice, of course, was that it was far easier said than done.

And so once again he took that same path, deeply rutted and familiar.

At night in that damned, silk-swaddled bed, Curufin would wonder what Finrod saw, as he braced himself over Finrod’s body and his dark hair fell over his shoulders and curtained them both. Finrod liked him to undo his hair from its tight plait, liked to let it fall loose on his shoulders, silky and slightly kinked from the braid.

_When you look up at me and see dark hair and grey eyes, do you see him?_

“Curufinwë,” whispered Finrod.

_Do you wish for him, and in me seek a replacement?_

“You are thinking too loudly. I am here, beneath you. Look at me.”

_Am I as close as you can get to your great lost love?_

“First of all,” said Finrod clearly, making Curufin jump and realize that he had not been hearing a word Finrod was saying, “ ‘great lost love’? I beg your pardon, but those are your words, not mine.”

“And this is my head, not yours,” said Curufin, annoyed. “Get out.”

“You know it’s not intentional,” said Finrod, carding his fingers through Curufin’s hair. “I do my best to respect the boundaries of thought, always. But when we are so close,” he tilted his hips, and tightened his thighs, and drew Curufin closer in, “when you are already within me, it is easy to fall into your thoughts without intending to. Especially when they are so thunderously written across your face.” He traced a long finger down Curufin’s sharp jaw. “And when they are distracting you from what I would like you to be doing.”

Curufin shook him off. “Stop your prattling then and let me finish.”

“So romantic,” sighed Finrod, and pulled him down so he could kiss his neck. “You know,” he murmured, as Curufin made a noise and started to move again. “If all I sought was grey eyes and dark hair, I could practically take my pick of the Noldor. I would hardly go to the trouble of seducing _you_ , you stubborn, prickly, ridiculous…”

“Now who’s being romantic?” Curufin turned his head and caught Finrod’s lips to shut him up. “And who says you seduced me?”

“What else do you call me all but laying myself across your anvil and asking you to defile me?”

“I call that you being drunk on Dwarven ale, and also the culmination of many months of careful manipulation.” Curufin felt Finrod’s body shake with silent laughter. “I do not get seduced, Felagund. If you proffered yourself to me, it is because I wanted you to.”

“My point is that obviously I am not using you as some sort of replacement.” Finrod murmured the words low into Curufin’s ear. “I want you for _you_. And because you wanted me to want you, of course, and you get what you want.” There was still an echo of laughter in his voice that Curufin chose to ignore.

“Good, because I am not a replacement for him. I do not care if you see some resemblance, I refuse to be his shade, or his stand-in, for you.”

“ _Curvo_ ,” said Finrod emphatically, wrapping a hand around the back of Curufin’s neck. “You are being ridiculous. And you look nothing like Makalaurë. His hair has far more curl, for one, and your eyes are lighter, and your bone structures are utterly different; you have your father’s face if anyone’s, and the fingers of an artisan, not a musician, and his build is more – ”

“I am glad you remember so clearly what he looks like.”

“Curvo, for _Eru’s_ sake.”

“Leave Eru out of it,” said Curufin waspishly, and finished first, out of spite. He pulled out of Finrod and free of his arms, and ignored Finrod’s sigh. He turned onto his side, experiencing a glimmer of satisfaction in feeling the bed shake as Finrod took his own pleasure in hand.

He pretended to have fallen asleep by the time Finrod finished with a gasp. He closed his eyes pointedly as Finrod sat up to clean himself, and tightened the bedclothes over his shoulders. Finrod lay down, maneuvering despite the tightly wrapped sheets, and pressed against Curufin’s back, wrapping an arm around his waist.

“I know you are awake,” he said softly, and Curufin weighed the benefits of a loud, fake snore. At the very least it would be rude, and either way would make it clear that he was not interested in further conversation. But it was a tactic worthy of Celegorm, in truth, and so instead he lay still as Finrod rested his chin on his shoulder for a while, waiting, before giving up and turning away.

It was what he had wanted, but somehow Curufin felt none of the thrill of a win as Finrod blew the candle out and they both fell silent in the darkness. He waited for Finrod to try again, to say his name into the still room.

Finrod could never resist a second attempt, but Curufin fell asleep waiting for him to speak.

 

* * *

 

 

_It was too hot a day for his father to allow him to work in the forge, and so Curufinwë had tucked himself into a cool alcove at the shady end of the house, adjacent to Makalaurë’s room. He had intended to pass the time sketching ideas into his notebook, but was closer to drowsing off from the heat when he heard light footsteps in the hallway. Peering around the corner of the alcove, he saw a distinct figure make its way to Makalaurë’s half open door and slip in._

_It was only the briefest glimpse, but there was no mistaking that golden braid. Curufinwë left his notebook in the alcove and padded noiselessly to where Findaráto had gone into his brother’s room, leaving the door slightly ajar._

_“Findaráto!” Makalaurë looked up from where he was playing a sweet, meaningless tune on his lap harp on the window seat. He smiled. “You came.”_

_“Yes,” Findaráto said softly. “You wanted to see me?”_

_“I did.” Makalaurë’s face had that intent light about it that it got when he was inspired and excited. “I have been working on a composition and I realize it is not a stand-alone piece – No, it was is part of a greater story I have been hoping to tell, on the stage, in three acts. I have been up all night, imagining the structure, and when I woke the clearest thing was whom I was imagining as the central character.” He reached out and touched Findaráto’s hand. “It could be no one but you.”_

_“Truly?”_

_“Absolutely. I wrote the part for you without even realizing what I was doing, and now I see it could be no other way. You still have your harp, do you not?”_

_“Of course. The one I purchased, on your suggestion, from the artisan in – ”_

_“Perfect, then we will not need to find one for you.” Makalaurë was talking raptly, on his feet now, and Curufinwë knew he was hardly absorbing what anyone else might say to him, so caught was he in his vision. “You shall be beautifully suited to the part, with your height, and your coloring, and your hair…” He picked up the end of Findaráto’s braid and brushed it idly over his palm.  “Braided with flowers and gems, I think. And your voice is lovely – young and unmolded, of course, but that suits what I have in mind.”_

_Findaráto smiled, clearly catching some of Makalaurë’s excitement, his cheeks flushed with pleasure in being so praised. “You think I can fulfill your vision?”_

_“There is no doubt in my mind.”_

_They were standing quite close together now. Findaráto raised his head, cast in gold by the open window, and Makalaurë’s eyes lit up. He traced his thumb very gently down the curve of Finrod’s cheek. “You are so beautiful in Laurelin's light,” he said, wonderingly. He was looking at Findaráto, Curufinwë thought, the way Fëanáro examined gems, or Nerdanel uncut stone._

_“Makalaurë,” whispered Findaráto, and parted his lips._

_Slowly, softly, Makalaurë kissed them._

_They made a pretty picture, posed there in the window, Curufinwë acknowledged bitterly. Findaráto’s golden hair seemed to glow, and it struck a pleasing contrast with Makalaurë’s soft dark curls. Findaráto was taller but slimmer, and the way Makalaurë laid a hand to his waist sketched the graceful line of a musician placing bow to strings. Curufinwë wondered, cynically, if they knew just how charming a tableau they painted, and he decided they probably did._

_When they broke apart, Findaráto’s face was glowing with happiness. He held on to Makalaurë’s wrist as Makalaurë caressed his face once more._

_“So beautiful,” Makalaurë murmured. “Like a work of art.”_

_“I do not wish to be a work of art,” said Findaráto, catching his hand and kissing the palm frantically. “I wish only to be yours.”_

_Makalaurë pulled his hand away, looking surprised. “Mine? Oh, Ingoldo, we’ve talked about this.”_

_“But the way you kissed me just now…”_

_“I couldn’t resist.” Makalaurë smiled ruefully. “You were standing there, already like the actor in my play, and all the world yearned for me to hit my cue, to lean in and kiss your lovely lips. It was a moment of bittersweet memory, a taste of sweetness for what once was…”_

_“What once was?” Findaráto’s voice had risen, sharpened, and Makalaurë winced._

_“Ai, lower your voice, Ingoldo.”_

_“I won’t! What_ was? _What about what is? What about what – who – is standing right in front of you?”_

_“Calm down, hush, you will bring the whole household – ”_

_“I don’t care! I am not a concept, Makalaurë, nor a piece of art, nor an actor in a play. I’m real, flesh and blood, and I love you!” His voice caught, and Makalaurë actually retreated._

_“No, you misunderstood me. We are still…this still will not work. Don’t you see?”_

_“You asked me here!”_

_“It was for the play.”_

_“You kissed me!”_

_“I couldn’t help it!”_

_Findaráto make an outraged noise. “Oh, how unfortunate for you! Coerced into it, were you? Well, I cannot help this!” He seized Makalaurë’s harp from beside the window seat and threw it, with quite a bit of force, through the open window._

_Makalaurë cried out in shock and dismay. “Findaráto!”_

_Findaráto stood framed in the window. A light breeze had come up, setting his mussed hair dancing, and his cheeks were dark with anger and emotion. Every line in his body trembled with fury, and Makalaurë took a step back._

_“You are going to need to find a new_ _lead_ _for your play, Makalaurë, because you shall not have this one! I believe that I am not properly equipped – in fact, I am sure that if I return home now, I will find my harp quite unusable.”_

Even now, _Curufinwë thought._ They are each arranging themselves like actors in a scene, for best effect. What a shame that I am the only one to witness it.

_Later, of course, Findaráto would share the theater with a far larger audience, when he destroyed his harp in the courtyard of his family’s city house, and rumors flew that he had declared never to play again._

_(The fact that he would later break his word on this matter did not comfort Curufinwë much.)_


	3. Though I loved him for his faults as much as for his good

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Breaking points (turning points?) are reached.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 0\. Warnings for Curufin discovering just what might actually drive Finrod to violence, slight roughness, more Conversations while making love, I am sorry I am so predictable. And one more flashback...

Curufin let out a gasp that he covered with a curse when he felt slim but strong hands seize his arm, lightly twist it up behind his back, and press him against the wall.

“You’ve been avoiding me,” a voice murmured at his ear.

“Can you blame me,” he gritted out, turning his face away from the wall and trying to glare back over his shoulder, “if this is the treatment I receive at your hands? Let go, Ingoldo.”

“I resort to this only because gentle words and meaningful touches do not seem to have convinced you,” said Finrod, letting his weight press against Curufin’s back. Curufin, despite himself, shifted his hips to settle against the curve of Finrod’s. “I know you are often short of word and mean of temper, but you are not usually so long from me.” He closed his lips over the lobe of Curufin’s ear, a teasing almost-bite. “I have missed you.”

“Oh, so you wish to have me trailing you like a lovesick child?” spat Curufin, suddenly furious, and wrenched his arm from Finrod’s grasp. Finrod let him go, but kept him pressed to the wall, bracketed by his arms. “I am sorry to tell you, Felagund, but not all drool for your attentions and creep by your heel, longing to be thrown a bone!”

“This kind of canine imagery – and crude allusion – is far more the purview of your brother,” Finrod observed mildly. “You are usually more eloquently spoken."

"Sorry to disappoint you." Curufin tried to push himself free, but succeeded only in shoving himself back against Finrod's chest. "You know how I so  _yearn_  for your approval."

"Hardly," said Finrod, but he did not move away. "And you are a fool if you think I want slavish devotion, Curufinwë.”

Curufin gave up on struggling, and switched tactics at the same speed at which he had lost his temper, dropping a purr into his voice instead. “Oh no? Never longed for fawning loyalty, have you?” He leaned back into Finrod’s chest, and let himself move teasingly against Finrod’s groin. “What of that parade of vassals yours, your pet Edain whom you spoiled and petted and took to your – ”

A hand wrapped over his mouth and Finrod’s voice came quietly at his ear. “There is much I will suffer from you, Atarinkë, much I will take from your barbed tongue. But as you have your lines, so I too have mine. _Choose more wisely what you mock_.”

Curufin laughed and bit at his fingers. “I think I’ve chosen wisely indeed if my goal was to enrage you. You know how much I enjoy watching fair, gentle Findaráto undone…”

“You like me undone by candlelight,” said Finrod softly into his ear, his hand wandering down Curufin's waist to grip the jut of his hip. “You like me begging and you like me powerless, you like my hair unbound and my hands tied. You like when I _need_ you. But you do not know what you ask for. You have not seen me undone by rage.” There was something dangerous in his voice, and Curufin felt desire surge in him. It was true, Finrod raging was not something he had enjoyed before, and he suddenly craved it. Craved it, if nothing else, to match the obsessive jealousy, the slow-burning resentment that ate at him from the inside.

“I am tired of gentle Findaráto,” he said. “I wish for sharp Findaráto, angry, pressing his suit where it is not welcome. Is that what you so pressed upon the Edain? Were they willing when you took them to bed, or just too frightened to say no?”

Finrod slammed him so hard into the wall that Curufin winced, his fingers curling uselessly against the stone, one knuckle scraped bloody.

“I know you are just trying to incite me,” snarled Finrod. “But I don’t care. Hold your tongue, snake, you know _nothing_ of what you speak.”

“Was this how you planned to lure me back to your side? With insults and violence? Your father would be proud.” Curufin grinned. “ _My_ father would be proud.”

Whether it was the mention of Finarfin or Fëanor that did it, Finrod went still. His hands loosened on Curufin’s wrists, and his weight from Curufin’s back. He stepped away, and Curufin felt strangely bereft.

“My win, I think,” was all he said, as he turned from the wall and straightened his sleeves. There would be bruises on his wrists come the morrow - they were already mottling - and a long strip of skin on one knuckle had been scraped away.

Finrod’s eyes fell to the bruises, and the blood, and something flickered behind that serene gaze: regret, perhaps, or excitement.

“This was not how I intended this interaction to go.”

“Good.”

They looked at each other a moment, Curufin with an eyebrow raised, Finrod somewhere between angry and abashed.

Finally, Finrod let out his breath. “Come to my chambers?” he said, quietly.

“What, you do not wish to have me here against the wall?”

“There are many things I wish,” said Finrod. “And right now, it is for us to be alone together somewhere where no one can walk in.”

“If you say so.” Curufin turned and began walking down the hall towards Finrod’s suite. “But history would not bear out that assertion.”

 

* * *

 

_Curufinwë was sitting on the riverbank in the shade, trying to work out a particularly noxious formula in his notebook. He’d been banished outside by his mother, who said he would start to turn white and wrinkle up like a maggot if he didn’t get out of the house more often, and Tyelkormo had taken it upon himself to ‘introduce the brat to the great outdoors’. Fortunately he had been able to give his brother the slip as soon as Irissë had turned up, clad in white leathers and pointedly not paying attention to Tyelkormo. The minute Tyelkormo had loped over to pull Irissë’s braid and mutter something that made her take a swipe at him, Curufinwë had ducked off and vanished himself to the relatively quiet refuge of the river. There was a group of young people further down the bank, laughing and splashing, but he could ignore them easily enough as he tried to make the formulae cooperate and simultaneously calculate the melting point of copper._

_“It is a lovely day to be absorbed in such meticulous work,” said a light voice, and he looked up with a start. Findaráto was standing beside him, looking down curiously at his notebook. “But rather warm.”_

_“Only if you’re the type on whom the day has an impact,” Curufinwë retorted. “My brain functions fine whether fair or foul outside.”_

_“I have no doubt that it does.” Seeming to ignore Curufinwë’s glare, Findaráto seated himself lightly on the bank beside him. “Your mind being one noted for its sharpness.” He sounded sincere. “Your work certainly looks interesting.”_

_“You’re lying,” said Curufinwë. “Or being polite, which I suppose is the charming way of describing a lie. I know nothing that is not poetry, philosophy, or music will turn_ your _head.”_

_“Oh, is that so? Have you narrowed my interests down so neatly to three? Goodness, how tidy.” Findaráto hummed and burrowed bare toes into the grass. “You would know me well, considering our dearth of interactions. We have not talked much, have we, Atarinkë?”_

_“No,” said Curufinwë, feeling mulish at the use of his mother-name. “I don’t think we have much in common.”_

_“Well,” said Findaráto, “that is a self-reinforcing notion, isn’t it? You assume we have nothing in common, so you do not speak to me, and from our lack of contact you further suppose that we do not speak because we share no interests, and so you continue to not speak – ”_

_“I get the concept,” said Curufinwë. “Being, as you observed, rather sharp of mind. And it is not simply that I don’t speak to you,_ you _do not speak to_ me. _”_

_“True,” said Findaráto seriously, “and it is this fact that I am trying to remedy in coming over and making conversation with you, despite the sharpness of your mind – and tongue.” He smiled, and Curufinwë felt his fingers twitch on the quill in his hand. He set it down, and curled his fingers into his palm._

_“Are you making fun of me?”_

_“What? No, of course not.” Findaráto looked surprised at the notion._

_“People can see you,” said Curufinwë, glancing down the river to where the youths were still frolicking in the shallow water. “You have done your due diligence, you may leave now before anyone thinks less of you for associating with me.” The youths were Vanyar, and unlikely to think better of a small, pale-skinned, acid-tongued youngest son with queer interests, for all he was a prince of the House of Finwë._

_“Why would they think less of me?”_

_“I don’t – They just would,” said Curufinwë, nettled. “You can_ go _, I said, people will_ see _you with me.”_

_“I don’t mind if people see me with you,” said Findaráto serenely. He leaned back on his hands, one of which was very close to Curufinwë’s thigh. Curufinwë glanced at it, blessing whatever luck had determined that he not inherit his mother’s blushing skin as Carnistir had. “I am not here for other people, I am here because my interest has finally won out and driven me to greet you. If I am bothering you, you can ask me to leave, but I sought your company because I would like to partake of it. And because,” he looked absently into Curufinwë’s notebook, and Curufinwë caught a very shrewd, and unexpected light in his eye, “because your estimation of the melting point of copper is off by at least 3 degrees.”_

 

* * *

 

 

In Finrod’s rooms they turned and faced each other once again, but this time they were close enough that Finrod could reach out and smooth his hands over Curufin’s shoulders, straightening the wrinkles he had left earlier. He let his hands rest briefly on Curufin’s breast and then began to undo the buttons of his collar, working his way down his chest in a businesslike manner.

Curufin watched, letting himself be disrobed, and then reached out to do likewise, undoing the laces and hooks of Finrod’s council robes, brushing his fingertips over the ornate embroidery.

Finrod pulled Curufin’s shirt open and slipped it over his shoulders at the same time that Curufin pushed Finrod’s robe back. Finrod’s hands went to Curufin’s belt, but Curufin stepped back out of his grasp, unbuckling the belt himself and sliding his breeches over his hips. Finrod was already bare, having stepped free of his long robes. As ever, he wore nothing at all beneath them (and knowledge of this fact was often enough to have Curufin impatient and sharp-tongued at the council table, watching Finrod cross his long legs beneath his robes and knowing, too well, what–)

“Come,” murmured Finrod, taking Curufin’s hand. He led him to the bed and urged him down against the pillows, kneeling between Curufin’s parted thighs and trailing a hand down his bare chest. “You have done me a great disservice.”

“Many. Which do you have in mind?”

“That you could think,” Finrod broke off. He shook his head, and closed his mouth. He leaned forward and kissed Curufin very softly. “You doubt me,” he whispered, “and I would not have it be so.” He bent forward, and the Nauglamír, which stayed ever around his neck, swung forward against Curufin’s collarbones. Curufin raised a hand to grasp it as Finrod wrapped long fingers around his thigh and drew it up to his waist.

Lately, Curufin had objected to Finrod taking him, had reacted with teeth and rough hands to Finrod between his thighs, and Finrod had always backed off, always yielded, always allowed Curufin to roll him over and take him as he wished. But tonight…

“It is not that I doubt,” said Curufin, his eyes closed, “only that I remember.”


	4. Who pawned the lie on me when he looked brassly at my shyest secret

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What came before, what is now. (What will be?)
> 
> Stop me before I conjugate myself into irredeemable pretension.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 0\. Broken hearts, in the past, and sex, in the present. Something that might almost be...tender. But might be something else, as well.

_They sat together under a tree, Curufinwë’s fingertips resting lightly on Findaráto’s palm as Findaráto ran his fingers up and down the inside of Curufinwë’s wrist._

_“You can truly wield a hammer as well with one hand as the other?”_

_“It is not so hard. My father had me start the practice young, and it became habit.”_

_Findaráto withdrew his hand to fiddle in his pocket for something, and Curufinwë let his own drop to the ground, empty._

_“I try to write or draw with my non-dominant hand at times,” Findaráto said, ruefully, flipping through the notebook to show Curufinwë an example. “But it’s rather a mess. Look, here is a daffodil I drew first with the left, and then with the right. Do you see the differences?”_

_Curufin did, but it was the other page of the notebook, opposite the flowers, that his eyes were drawn to. The page scrawled thick with words, scribbled with cross outs._

 

> ~~_Makalaurë_ ~~
> 
> _My ~~Dear~~_ _Makalaurë_
> 
> _~~Beloved~~ _ ~~~~
> 
> _Please, Makalaurë, won’t you –_
> 
> _I can’t ~~stop thinking about you~~ do this_
> 
> _Please, please, Makalaurë_

_He blinked, and looked up, as Findaráto flipped the book shut, apparently not noticing where he had been looking. “But oh well, with practice I expect I shall improve,” he was saying cheerfully. “Perhaps you can teach me any techniques your father used with you, to help? I know I may be too old, they say skills like this are best learned very young, when the mind is still flexible and forming, but I think I have_ _some flexibility left yet!”_ _He smiled at Curufinwë, who felt lightheaded, like there was less air there in the privacy of the willow boughs. Lightheaded, like he sometimes got when standing quickly after too long sitting, or when the forge grew too hot, or when he foolishly agreed to sample some of Tyelkormo's moonshine._

_Lightheaded, or perhaps intoxicated._

_Findaráto cocked his head and looked at him questioningly. “Yes?”_

_“Nothing,” said Curufinwë. “I – Why? I said nothing.”_

_“You looked funny. You sometimes do.” Findaráto reached out and touched Curufinwë’s cheek affectionately. “You pull your brows down and your eyes go bright and your mouth, well, your mouth…” His thumb hovered over Curufinwë’s lips, and Curufinwë forced himself to breathe. It was going to happen again, it had to, like the other times, the other, magical, airless moments - few, too few - when Findaráto had leaned forward and kissed him without seeming to think about it, had brought their mouths together like it was easy, like it was meant to be._

_Curufinwë had never wanted anything so badly to_ mean.

_But Findaráto pulled his hand away, looking preoccupied, and Curufinwë jerked back before he could overbalance and fall face first into Findaráto’s lap._

_“It’s funny, how things happen sometimes,” Findaráto said, and Curufinwë said, “Is it?”_

_“Yes. Not so long ago, I would have thought I could never be happy again, never again find a reason to smile, or laugh, or sing." His eyes briefly darkened, but he shook his fair head, as if banishing a nagging fly. "But now,” he turned his face, bright and elated, onto Curufinwë, and Curufinwë felt his heart leap, “now I have found reason for joy.”_

_Daringly, Curufinwë reached out and took Findaráto’s hand, and Findaráto squeezed it. “Atarinkë, I think I have found meaning again. I think I have found a reason for my heart to be full once more.”_

_Curufinwë smiled, but couldn’t speak_. As have I.

_“I couldn’t believe it when I met her,” Findaráto said, and stood, pulling Curufinwë to his feet. “But there has never been a more perfect woman. She even studies botany!”_

_Curufinwë was still, certain he had missed something, sure some long scene had surely passed him by, because nothing Findaráto was saying made any sense._

_“Rejoice for me, dear friend,” said Findaráto, kissing Curufinwë on the cheek. “Her name is Amarië.”_

_And all of Curufinwë’s great hopes came crashing down, with the finality of a cymbal crash, the last blow of a hammer on an anvil._

Not yours, you fool, never yours.

_Findaráto was still holding his hand, beaming, so transported with joy that it hurt to look at him._

You should have known. 

 _“I wish you every happiness,” he said, so coldly that Findaráto looked startled, and pulled away from him. “Enjoy your courtship,_ cousin.” _And he turned and strode away, shoulders rigid and back tight, and it would be many, many years before he spoke to Findaráto as a friend again._

_If ever he had._

 

* * *

 

 

“You are not my friend,” he said now, many miles and long years away from that moment beneath the willows, as Finrod pressed him down and kissed his throat and wrapped an arm under his back, pulling their bodies close together. “You never were.”

“I was your friend,” said Finrod, who would always insist on being insufferable, the gems that hung ever over his heart warm on Curufin's breast, “and now I am your lover, with all that entails.” He kissed Curufin on the mouth, long and sweet. “Dear one, we all have ghosts in our past, and I would not have you be haunted by mine. Not the ghosts of those I have known, nor the ghosts of my own poor actions.” He curled contrite fingers behind Curufin’s head, and let their noses brush together.

Curufin thought of Maglor, standing in the window, touching Finrod's cheek, kissing his lips. He thought of Finrod, taking his own hand beneath the willows; Finrod speaking so rapturously, so heedlessly cruel. 

“In my experience,” said Curufin, trying to be cool but finding his arms wrapping around Finrod’s waist tightly, “ghosts do not let you elect not to be haunted. The haunting is of their choosing, not ours.” Despite the memories crowding fast, he let Finrod kiss him, and even allowed Finrod to tip his chin up with light fingers, a tender gesture that usually he would pull away from.

“I do not believe that,” whispered Finrod, “I believe we have a hand in choosing our ghosts, whatever they are. But it matters not. I would exorcise these shades, and these doubts, and have you trust in me, and in what we have now. Not what my foolish young self did an age ago in another world.”

He was settled against Curufin’s hips now, his arousal clear though he made no effort to sate himself between Curufin’s thighs, simply letting his weight rest atop Curufin as he kissed his lips, his closed eyes, his temples.

“You are coddling me,” Curufin murmured, “as if I were my foolish young self, an age ago, in another world.”

“Will you let me?”

“Will you give me any other choice but to allow it?”

“You always have a choice,” said Finrod seriously, and kissed Curufin once more.

Curufin thought of Finrod weeping on the steps of their house, and then of him laughing as Curufin tried to guide him in the forge in an ill-advised attempt to turn him into a smith. He thought of Finrod clearing his throat from across the council table, ostensibly stern but with an amused light in his eyes, crossing his legs and letting his foot brush against Curufin's beneath the table. He thought of Finrod lost in passion; Finrod making him bleed; making him come.

_I was your friend, I am now your lover._

_With all that entails._

When Finrod finally moved into him, Curufin kept his eyes closed, not wishing to let his emotions be too easily seen, not wanting to know what Finrod might parse from what flickered behind his eyes. He should have known that Finrod did not need open eyes to sense what was happening behind them, and the words that he murmured into Curufin’s ear made Curufin bite his tongue all the harder and clench his eyes shut. But one hand fisted tightly in Finrod’s hair, and the other on Finrod’s shoulder blade, not letting him go, and this time he did not seek to rush to his climax. When he felt himself getting close, he whispered, “Findaráto, I am – ” and Finrod groaned and murmured, “Me too.”

Still Curufin hesitated, on the brink, something holding him back, but Finrod kissed his throat - so close, so close - and whispered, “Come for me, Atarinkë,” and slid a hand between them to wrap around Curufin’s cock. Then Curufin came, biting into Finrod’s shoulder, and felt Finrod pulse into him a moment later, whispering something almost prayerful.

“I would think an Arafinwion would find it blasphemous to cry out the name of the Star-kindler at the moment of climax,” Curufin said, once he could speak again, to diffuse whatever delicate thing still hovered between them. “Do you not think such crude renderings of the names of the Valar would be more the behavior of the likes of my forsaken ilk?”

“Hush,” muttered Finrod, shivering as he slid out of Curufin. “I have never heard you blaspheme during sex. In fact, I think you would catch fire if you called out the name of the Valar at the moment of pleasure.”

“That best have not been a jibe at the expense of my father.”

“Who, me? I wouldn’t dare.”

"On the contrary, you dare much, Felagund."

"Too much?"

"I didn't say that," said Curufin, but thought to himself,  _yes._

“You asked me,” Finrod said, much later, laying his head upon Curufin’s breast, “if I had ever broken anything because of you."

"I cannot believe you remember that," said Curufin, echoing Finrod's words back to him, and feeling something he refused to believe was embarrassment. "Why, have you remembered something you broke on my account?" 

"I have, if not in the way you meant it. I have broken a vow I made to myself – an age ago, in another world – that never again would I fall for one of your house. But oh,” he lifted his head and pressed his lips to Curufin’s throat, “how I have fallen.”

Curufin thought of private conversations held in Quenya or passing between minds only; the long plans that he and Celegorm would mull over, late at night; the schemes and secrets and names Celegorm would bring him, alone in their chambers, muttering, "Five more, and five on the way"; the tallies he wrote carefully on parchment, and later burned.

He wound Finrod’s hair around his hand and considered what it would look like braided. “Do you regret your fall?”

As he spoke, he thought of the long game he was playing, the plan set in motion by the loss of Himlad and the anger that burned in him after their flight – another exile, another loss, another  _shame_ – though perhaps the pieces had been moving even before that.

He played the game well, he knew, but he would play it better had he not grown so cursedly invested in one piece in particular.

Did he regret it?

“I ask myself that nearly every day,” said Finrod, and his hair slid over them both, a soft, golden curtain, as Curufin pondered regret. “And always I answer – Never.”

_Never._

“That is foolish of you.”

“Well,” said Finrod, and in that moment, Curufin was certain that he knew. “I am very, very foolish.”

The ghosts were not gone. The roof was still set against the sky, and the burn of impatience remained lit within him. Plans and schemes and desires stayed where they ever dwelt, in the back of his mind.

But for now, Curufin smiled, and held his fool, and thought about the serendipity of falling.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1\. Dear [ten-thousand-leaves](http://ten-thousand-leaves.tumblr.com/), thank you so much for this prompt! This giveaway was a pleasure to write, and you have me so onboard this Finrod/Maglor-->Finrod/Curufin ship that I may never be the same again.
> 
> I hope you have enjoyed this as much as I have <3


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